5 advices on hedgehog pet

June 25, 2017

A hedgehog pet commonly known as African pygmy hedgehog has now become a popular choice among pet lovers. They can be terrific pets for you as well as your family. These small companions are now increasing in popularity as home pets.

Even though a hedgehog pet makes excellent pets in general, you might want to know some facts about them before owning one. These points give you a brief idea as to whether these pets are suited for you or not.

Proper diet and nutrition and essential when it comes to hedgehog pets

If you own a hedgehog pet then you should be well informed about the strict and nutritious diet that they require. Even though they are very small creatures at sight, they require great overall care and proper and nutritious diets through their food. Many pet foods available in the market are of poor quality and may lack that right amount of nutrients required by our pets. So instead of going for these under-nourished hedgehog pet foods, some people feed them with quality cat foods which provide the required nutrition. Otherwise, an expensive hedgehog pet food or a mix of this with some other protein rich food can be considered. Wholesale purchase is also an excellent option as long as you can store it away from bacteria and moisture.

Accommodation or housing

Another cause of concern is the space and appropriate housing facility for these pets. So what is an ideal space for a single hedgehog? Well, a 2X3 inch cage seems to be providing a pretty good living habitat for a single hedgehog pet. Bigger cages are more comfortable as long as your pets are concerned. Cages with wire bars are most common while other new types are also bought by customers based on their convenience. The place where these cages are kept also needs to be taken care of. The condition in the cage should be of stable and right temperature for your pets without any kind of hazards or threats.

The owner should have great love and passion for their pets when it comes to pets such as this. Hedgehogs have spines pointed outwards and project outwards when they curl into a ball. This happens occasionally. So handling a nervous hedgehog pet can be quite tricky at times of the owner is not well informed of its habits. Thankfully, they would not shoot out their quills as a defense mechanism. So when these creatures go into their defense mechanism, the person should hold them softly till they relax and return to normal.

Spitballs are natural and are not causes for alarm

Sometimes when these pets smell a new scent, they tend to throw up and spitballs start to develop in their mouth. This is not some dangerous sign or anything but is completely normal. These creatures have an intelligent in-built mechanism in their body by which, they throw up or spit saliva upon them so that they can camouflage themselves. This saves them from deadly predators in the wild. So you should always keep in mind that these balls of saliva, even though gross are perfectly safe.

These hedgehog pets are night owls. In other words, they are more accustomed to sleep during most of their daytime, while hunting prey at night. So if you are a person who goes to sleep early and if you are a heavy sleeper throughout the night hours, you might want to reconsider buying hedgehogs as you home companions.